I did an interview with Fox News about Seattle’s $15 an hour minimum wage, which of course is bringing a lot of new readers to HA. For example, Tom, who via email, goes out of his way to establish himself as an Old Testament Christian. Genesis 18-19, to be exact.
Here’s hoping the next earthquake, or better yet, wild fire, will wipe out everything within 50 miles of the existing coast …. If it should, I promise to celebrate even more joyfully than I did the death of the Chappaquiddick swim champ – toasting it with a grin on my face, a song in my heart and an appropriately delightful aged single malt I can savor in my memory for years as I recall the pleasure taken in the demise of the vile scum infesting this Republic.
Not sure what you have against the Olympic Peninsula, but hey, thanks for the constructive criticism, Tom!
As for the rest of my new Fox friends, please feel free to use this post as an open thread in which to wish death and/or destruction on us freedom-hating liberals.
Are we even within 50 miles of the coast?
Greetings from Seattle, Teabaggers! I just got back from a hot yoga session, had gay sex with my gay husband, smoked some legal pot on the street corner in full view of a police officer and a bus full of school children, and then sipped a latte on the rooftop veranda atop my midtown condo — but not before I stopped by to drop off my monthly contribution at Planned Parenthood! Isn’t life in latter-day Gomorrah grand?!
(Do they have satire or irony in the Fox flyover states yet?)
@ 2
They don’t recognize “humor” over there. Absurdity is just a word with no definable meaning.
Unless they start thinkin’ bout that fucked-up colored boy bein’ in the White House.
As a good christian, I too pray for death and destruction on my enemies for the mortal sin of giving the poor more money.
Wild fire? The guy never heard about all the rain we get in these parts? We have as much chance of getting consumed by wildfire as Megyn Kelly has in telling Dick Cheney he got the Iraq war wrong. What? Oops!
http://talkingpointsmemo.com/l.....wrong-iraq
“But time and time again, history has proven that you got it wrong as well in Iraq, sir,” Kelly said. “You said there was no doubt Saddam Hussein had weapons of mass destruction. You said the Iraq insurgency was in the last throes, back in 2005. And you said that after our intervention extremists would have to ‘rethink their strategy of jihad.'”
“Now with almost a trillion dollars spent there, with 4,500 American lives lost there, what do you say to those who say you were so wrong about so much at the expense of so many?” she asked.
“If some jobs are lost, but we lift tens of thousands of low-wage workers out of poverty, that’s a net plus in the long run,” said David Goldstein, who runs Horsesass.org.
And yet the CBO declines to state whether, in the long run, an increase in the federal minimum wage to $10.10 would be a plus or a minus to the economy, measured by the need to provide services and the effect on the budget deficit:
Federal spending and taxes would also be indirectly affected by the increases in real income for some people and the reduction in real income for others. As a group, workers with increased earnings would pay more in taxes and receive less in federal benefits of certain types than they would have otherwise. However, people who became jobless because of the minimum-wage increase, business owners, and consumers facing higher prices would see a reduction in real income and would collectively pay less in taxes and receive more in federal benefits than they would have otherwise. CBO concludes that the net effect on the federal budget of raising the minimum wage would probably be a small decrease in budget deficits for several years but a small increase in budget deficits thereafter. It is unclear whether the effect for the coming decade as a whole would be a small increase or a small decrease in budget deficits.
http://www.cbo.gov/publication/44995
Goldy, on what basis is it a ‘net plus’?
US labor force is 155 million people.
Seattle/Bellevue/Everett labor force is 1.5 million people, or 1% of the nation’s labor force. (King County 1.2596 million, couldn’t find Seattle proper)
CBO predicts that there is a 2/3 chance that up to one million jobs could be lost with an increase in the federal minimum wage to $10.10/hr.
Other than saying ‘some jobs’ could be lost, how many might one predict might be lost with a larger increase in the minimum wage?
Up to 10,000 in the Seattle/Everett/Bellevue area, possibly?
I just think that while we are saying that we’re lifting ‘tens of thousands’ out of poverty, we should also be honest enough to state that in doing so, we might be throwing ten thousand out of work, and eliminating income for, possibly, ‘tens of thousands’ of people in the area.
I don’t have numbers, nor the ability to make this calculation in the Seattle area, other than to extrapolate. YMMV.
But ‘some’ might be a handful. Begin telling people that thousands of jobs might be lost and the response might be different.
We know that polled support for increasing the federal minimum wage evaporates to 57% opposition when respondents are told how many people might lose their jobs if it happens.
Raise it, or don’t raise it. But don’t sweep the downside under the rug. There will be a downside.
@7 Well, we’re going to find out, won’t we? I think that’s what a lot of supply-siders fear most: that the Seattle experiment will prove the supply-siders wrong.
@ 8
I think that Seattle is one of the most likely places for it to succeed.
I also think one of the greatest concerns is that if it works in a thriving, high-tech city like Seattle, there might be an assumption – at least on the part of some – that it will work everywhere. That’s much more doubtful.
Worse things could happen than a Domino Effect, I suppose. San Francisco might be a better place for an ‘experiment’, given California’s woes, which aren’t shared by Washington state.
Just be a little careful what you wish for. Perhaps also realize that people like Deathfrogg will be among the most likely losers in your grand experiment.
“an appropriately aged single malt”
Are you sure The Piper hasn’t taken on a new alias?
Shorter Sloppy Travis Bickle @ 9, “THE SKY IS FALLING!!!!!”
@ 11
It’s not me it falls on.
Best death wishes to you, Goldy [and all your freedom-hating liberal friends]. Many happy returns!
:j